Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

[c1ue]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

This is going to be a huge mess that is going to take decades to clean up and pay for.

Certainly. A historic event plus a historically old reactor.

Now who wants to take a bet that the other reactors at Fukushima #1 will be put back into service at some point?

True for most every endeavor but when an iPad dies early is it really a big deal?

iPads don't produce power. They consume it.

No power plants = no usable iPad. No power plants = no usable electric cars or trains. No power plants = no household labor saving devices like dishwashers and microwaves.

You bet. A giant WHOOMP sound, a light show visible twenty miles away for ten minutes, and we're done with it. Sounds like a great deal.

And then 3 to 7 years to rebuild it.

In the meantime, no energy.

What a fantastic deal. /sarc

It always takes more time and money to repair than to build.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

People that lived in & survived Chernobyl, which is now a lesser disaster than this, would disagree that the radioactive contamination is not a big deal. I know what the official death & injury toll from Chernobyl was, and I have it 1st hand from people that lived through it that it is significantly worse, by an order of magnitude.

Not that there's any choice to not use nukes in a peak cheap oil world, but to say that the nuclear is not a big deal is not exactly accurate according to those that lived through it...

I believe there was only one death at Fukushima, a crane fell on a worker. Not one death occurred at Fukushima directly from radiation. A complete meltdown, and zero deaths from radiation. ZERO.

At Chernobyl, the people eat mushroom soup and root vegetables grown in the soil there. They are doing fine. The wildlife and ecosystem around Chernobyl have also recovered.

In hindsight, there was no reason to evacuate anyone around Fukushima except that they don't have electric power. But the area is safe and not contaminated.

You have plenty of predictions of deaths, but where are the deaths? Where are the cancers from radiation? There is plenty of scare from the eco-frauds who are marching now, but where are the deaths? Lots of concocted numbers, but no deaths--- except one worker had a crane fall on him at Fukushima.

The future is nuclear power for electricity, hydro-electric power, natural gas, upgraded oil from tar sands, and maybe synthetic oil from coal.

[peakishmael]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

The future is nuclear power for electricity, hydro-electric power, natural gas, upgraded oil from tar sands, and maybe synthetic oil from coal.

Then there's the wacky Germans, now installing megawatts of industrial solar PV -- and exactly zero new nuclear plants. In fact, are aggressively shutting down their nuke plants. Those ecoterrorists! Why would they do such a stupid thing?

Could it be that solar is much cheaper than nuclear per generated watt?

Could it be that operating costs are lower?

Could it be that a solar plant can be installed in perhaps 1/10 the time of a nuclear plant?

Could it be because solar doesn't create nuclear waste?

Could it be, gasp, safety issues?

Nah, can't be. The Germans know nothing of engineering, or physics, or business, or economics. They are silly greenies.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Photo-voltaic is actually the most expensive form of energy for electricity, as the Germans will find-out soon. As I have always said, the only viable solar is passive solar for water-heating, and even for that use, you had better have rather low expectations. And don't even try passive solar for water-heating unless you are in a desert with plenty of sunshine. Passive solar for house heating is worse, and you will need a drape-slave to open and close the thermal drapes, exactly on time, otherwise the solar heat you gain during the sunshine of day is quickly lost in the twilight of the evening. The dark of night makes the house cold, and a passive solar home can be a net-loser for heat without a thermal drapes.

[sunskyfan]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Does it ever occur to you that maybe, just maybe, we are going to have to adjust our lifestyle? Also, I am not throwing the nuclear baby out with the bath water either but currently the way it is done is bad engineering. Even if we went full fledged into nuclear it would cover our current energy needs and growth as oil is depleted. Yes, Fukishima is an extraordinary event but it is, and will not be, a singular event. I always laugh when nuclear proponents bring up the question of whether I am willing to give my hair dryer or dishwasher because it is asked as if I would be giving up my Utopian life of perfection. If Utopia is a hair dryer and a dishwasher I think I would want a change anyway ;).

[c1ue]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Could it be that solar is much cheaper than nuclear per generated watt?

Sorry, this is patently false.

Only in the premise where installation cost is ignored, and cost of capital invested is ignored, is this even potentially correct.

Property taxes alone for solar power appear to exceed normal retail electricity price - at least in Michigan...

http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...Property-Taxes

In this real life example: a Fukushima era nuclear power plant has 1/60th the property taxes of a modern, 1 year old solar tax farm (0.2 cents/kwh vs. 12.3 cents/kwh).

Given that nuclear power plants generate electricity at a fuel cost lower than coal (11 cents/kwh), doesn't seem like solar costs are so much lower.

[don]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

How much are the costs of nuclear reactors socialized?

[Starving Steve]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Another point that the eco-frauds won't tell you is that solar is cheap on its first watt provided that you don't count the capital cost. And then the solar dies.

If I pick-up a penny on the ground, the profit margin is fantastic--- on the first penny. But then I have to work harder for the second penny, even harder for the third penny, etc. I have to do plenty of walking in a shopping mall before I have my fourth penny. My back aches by my fifth penny. It's dinner time by my sixth penny, and the mall is closing.

To make six cents, I wasted an hour of time, and my back aches. I'm hungry too, plus I missed the bus and have to stand waiting for the next bus in the rain in order to go home. But that first penny was fantastic; the profit margin in percent profit in terms of investment was better than any business venture I know of.

And this is the story with solar in terms of cost per watt of electricity generated, providing I don't count the capital cost of the solar-electric cell. The problem is that I need cheap and reliable mega-watts, all year long, next to a city, and solar turns-out to be the most expensive, by far, for meeting this need. The capital costs and the land costs are enormous, plus the sun has to shine, every day, and there can be no winter (low-Sun season).

But let the German engineers discover these basics about solar-electric. Actually, I think they already have, judging from the remarks from Germans lately about lending the Club Med nations more money (for their solar and other green energy bubbles).

I found my seventh penny out at the bus stop, but it was bent, run-over by buses, and not usable for money.

[don]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

another point that the eco-frauds won't tell you is that solar is cheap on its first watt provided that you don't count the capital cost.

wtf?

[lektrode]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

wtf?

uh huh, was my thot too
while mr steve does make some good points, re 'eco fraud' i dont think he considers the value in having a source of electricity that he would own outright, sitting up on his roof, kranking out watts, never mind in the event of a power outage, rolling blackout or some other form of unplanned shutdown/brownout of the grid.

the japanese are discovering just how inconvenient that becomes.

and with just a little bit of change in ones consumption patterns, such as
NOT USING ELECTRICITY TO MAKE HEAT (using gas to cook, dry clothes etc, heat house); using passive, as he calls it, solar water heating (which works on most days, even cloudy ones, long as the clouds arent thick/tall enuf to rain or its not snowing cold) - that one can get most if not ALL of ones electric power needs from PV solar - and while it might not have the same internal rate of return in areas where hydro or coal/gas is the predominant means of generation, it does stack up quite favorably to most any form of 'safe' investment, esp in areas where the price of power is high (i pay 44cents/kwh, tho too much cloud for _my_ income bracket to justify the capital cost - this rate is plenty high enuf to justify conversion to CFL lightbulbs, tankless/propane water heating, cooking, drying etc and it wouldnt take too much more in kwh costs to make me rethink the grid as primary source)

the biggest benefit to going with solar/PV isnt what is 'saved' in present time, but what it _will_ be worth in the future, after the meltdown of the currency, never mind if something forces rolling blackouts = fairly good likelyhood in the not too distant future, regardless of currency/inflation issues.

but i'm just a guy who actually watches the numbers and the price gets better every year.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Sad to say, it looks like the future, by default and thanks to the eco-frauds, is going to be powered by COAL. Here are some advantages of coal: cheap, available, easy, it does the job, and coal is very labour intensive.

I can actually imagine coal trains and coal trucks in our future. How sad!

And how do the eco-frauds in British Columbia heat their homes now--- not by solar, although they will never admit it. They heat their homes by burning WOOD. And just like coal, wood is very labour intensive ----- a job creator.

Carbon is the future. Sad! And it will be a replay of Henderson, Nevada all over again. The eco-frauds who made a big issue of climate change and CO2 will be the big users of COAL, by default. And the CO2 will be belched-out into the atmosphere, everywhere.

[nathanhulick]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

You try to scare the hell out of people here by making an issue of coolant water. When I was at the Univ. of Minnesota, I took a sample of secondary-coolant water from the Monticello nuclear power plant, and the water was so non-radioactive as to be drinkable. We ran the sample into the atomic-spectometre at the Univ. of Minnesota in the Twin Cities, and the water was drinkable. It was non-radioactive. I took the grab-sample of secondary coolant water right out of the pipe from the reactor.

Primary coolant is no big issue, and a brief exposure to fuel rods is no big issue. As I posted here, my uncle has a fuel rod, even partially cut-away exposing the black uranium oxide on his desktop. The fuel rod portion is encased in clear lucite plastic and is a paper weight on his desk, a presentation from his company.

I am not a nuclear engineer, but I think I know enough about how reactors work to make a comment here.

From this statement, it seems as if you do not understand the difference between secondary coolant water, which is never in contact with radioactive material, and contaminated water that has been exposed to the core.

[fallout]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

So it would seem.

Much of the cost of a conventional, water-cooled nuclear power plant is due to cooling system complexity. These are part of the safety of the overall design, and thus require extensive safety systems and redundant backups. A water-cooled reactor is generally dwarfed by the cooling systems attached to it. Additional issues are that the core irradiates the primary loop water with neutrons causing the water and impurities dissolved in it to become radioactive and that the high pressure piping in the primary side becomes embrittled and requires continual inspection and eventual replacement. Such systems are maintenance and survivability nightmares.
There are much more modern nuclear power system designs that make better sense, the circa 1970 Fukushima plant was not one of them.

[lektrode]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

Sad to say, it looks like the future, by default and thanks to the eco-frauds, is going to be powered by COAL. Here are some advantages of coal: cheap, available, easy, it does the job, and coal is very labour intensive.

I can actually imagine coal trains and coal trucks in our future. How sad!

And how do the eco-frauds in British Columbia heat their homes now--- not by solar, although they will never admit it. They heat their homes by burning WOOD. And just like coal, wood is very labour intensive ----- a job creator.

Carbon is the future. Sad! And it will be a replay of Henderson, Nevada all over again. The eco-frauds who made a big issue of climate change and CO2 will be the big users of COAL, by default. And the CO2 will be belched-out into the atmosphere, everywhere.

the burning of anything simply to make heat is the problem, why nuclear power is THE ONLY ANSWER going forward
and why i say the ultimate tragedy in japan (beyond the lives/property lost to the quake/wave, as little actual damage has been done directly by the nukes, aside from them blowing up, of course - the radiation release is ultimately minimal beyond the immediate vicinity) is this event will cause the eco-fraud/luddite-industrial complex to go into HYPER-PROTEST mode against virtually everything nuclear and/or 'risky' far as energy sources and production - we've just seen the first of this in reaction to last years drilling-rig disaster in the gulf of mexico (and even that hasnt had any apparent long-range impact, seeing as the fisheries are genl'y back in biz?) - my immediate observation is that 100years ago, the lumber and paper industries had mowed-down essentially every tree standing in NH - and today? NH is 98% wooded - the luddite brigade, or the eco-frauds as you call em, wouldve been howling no doubt, about "the disaster from logging the great north woods" and what would've been the outcome? instead of wood, most of the houses would've been built out of what? mud bricks?
IMHO, i dont believe there is _anything_ that man could possibly do to this planet that wouldnt be completely disappeared within a couple hundred years of human life disappearing/extinction - and considering that _most_ of the life forms as have existed on the planet of the past 100million years (out of 4 billion years) has gone extinct? what could we possibly do to earth that would still be around or a problem a 1000years after man is gone? radiation? ha.

[lektrode]

Re: Fukushima: Little by Little . . .

lektrode
Sorry, but someone HAS profited from this. The ledger is not one sided.

As to the design. US has dropped the ball in the area of Nuclear Engineering a long time ago. Same ol' crapola designs were turned out because it was cheap to do. New designs and ideas may were being developed but they stayed on the bookshelves.

again, the eco-fraud/luddite-industrial complex has stymied virtually every advance in energy source or production.
the PC-crazed political climate in The US feeds on this and the DC aristocracy continues to listen to them and what % of the electorate are they, anyway? 5-10% (about what the samesex marriage lobby is)

what has happened is that we now have tyranny of the minority and its the direct cause of the gridlock and polarization of politix that we are _clearly_ suffering from in The US today